After a decades-long dispute between Arabs and Kurds over the oil-rich northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, it took just an hour and a half for its fate to be decided.

As al-Qaida-inspired militants advanced across northern Iraq and security forces melted away, Kurdish fighters who have long dominated Kirkuk ordered Iraqi troops out and seized full control of the regional oil hub and surrounding areas, according to a mid-ranking Army officer. He said he was told to surrender his weapons and leave his base.

"They said they would defend Kirkuk from the Islamic State," said the Arab officer, who oversaw a warehouse in the city's central military base. He asked that his rank not be made public.

The Kurdish takeover of the long-disputed city came days after the extremist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and other Sunni militants seized much of the country's second largest city of Mosul and Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit before driving south toward Baghdad. Their lightning advance has plunged the country into its worst crisis since the 2011 withdrawal of U.S. troops.

A spokesman for Kurdish forces, known as the peshmerga, said they had only moved in after Iraqi troops retreated, assuming control of the "majority of the Kurdistan region" outside the semi-autonomous Kurdish Regional Government.

"Peshmerga forces have helped Iraqi soldiers and military leaders when they abandoned their positions,"

A lawmaker from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Shiite-led bloc condemned the peshmerga's move, calling it a "plot" carried out in coordination with the regional government that would "lead to problems."

"The Kurds have taken advantage of the current situation. They seized Kirkuk and they have other plans to swallow other areas," Mohammed Sadoun told The Associated Press.

One of the many political dances GWB had to perform was to promise Turkey and Saudi Arabia that he would not establish or allow to be established a Kurdish state. Such a state would destabilize Turkey, which has a substantial and oppressed Kurdish minority. I’m not sure what Saudi Arabia’s objection was. It seems, however, that Kurdish state is forming on its own. It may become the main post-Obama US ally as I believe they are anti-Iranian, anti-Turkish and pretty much anathema to Sunni’s and Shia. (If anybody could elaborate on the politics of this I’d be grateful.)

I also suspect that Israel will aid such a Kurdish state, which would give them a huge technological leg up on the surrounding Arabs and Persians.

After a decades-long dispute between Arabs and Kurds over the oil-rich northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, it took just an hour and a half for its fate to be decided. As al-Qaida-inspired militants advanced across northern Iraq and security forces melted away, Kurdish fighters who have long dominated Kirkuk ordered Iraqi troops out and seized full control... "They said they would defend Kirkuk from the Islamic State," said the Arab officer, who oversaw a warehouse in the city's central military base. He asked that his rank not be made public.

I also suspect that Israel will aid such a Kurdish state, which would give them a huge technological leg up on the surrounding Arabs and Persians.

Nobody's really sidled up to the Iraqi Kurds because (a) the leadership is a slippery bunch and (b) Iraqi Kurdistan is surrounded by Iraq, Syria, Iran and Turkey. Can't get to it without the consent of one of its hostile neighbors (hostile to us or hostile to Iraqi Kurdistan). Same problem we have with Afghanistan.

14
posted on 06/14/2014 10:18:44 AM PDT
by Zhang Fei
(Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world and that God will preserve it always.)

They need to define their territory and take control of it right now. I believe that is what they will do, and are doing. Circumstances are allowing them to do it, and circumstances are forcing them to do it.

This does look like the end of Iraq as a state. Instead there will be a Kurdistan, a Sunni Arab state, and probably two Shia states for a while, one with oil and the other without. IMO it will take the Shia so long to sort out their sharing issues that the Sunni Arabs will avoid ethnic cleansing and consolidate their state.

Edrogan of Turkey might block Kurdish oil exports for a while, but there will be so much money at stake that he'll be replaced by a Turkish leader who will take Kurdish oil money.

In the 1950's it was an extremely good idea. It put an end to the active fighting between the Greeks and Turks, which had been a boon to the Greek Communists. It gave us a close set of bases from which to threaten and spy on the USSR. It made the most powerful Muslim state in the world an ally to Israel. And it gave us a really big stick with which to keep the middle east in line, one the Soviets tried but failed to counter with Egypt.

Keep in mind that until the present administration the ruling party in Turkey had the official position that there is no Islamic vs. Western world. There is only modernity or the lack of it. Turkey has been a very good ally over the years. The invasion of Cypress is the only serious exception.

I wish someone would, using simple language, accurately explain Turkey vis-a-vis the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) and Turkey vis-a-vis the PKK (the Kurdish Marxist terrorist group at war with Turkey since the 1980s). And factor in the Kurdish region of Turkey which the PKK is trying to incite to war against Ankara. The very region of Turkey that I believe is also claimed by Armenia.

I will try to start it. That whole area is absolutely critical it seems to me.

From the posted article: He said it was unlikely the Kurds would seek formal independence from Iraq, however, because such a move would be strongly opposed by neighboring Turkey and Iran -- both of which have sizable Kurdish minorities -- as well as Washington.

". . . Ankara has entered into energy deals with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), something which has infuriated the central Iraqi government in Baghdad but which has helped the Kurds further build a foundation for their independence [yes true that] Ankara has been so alarmed by the growing Kurdish autonomy [in Syria and tolerated by Syria, I believe] that it reportedly has provided support for [ISIS] in their fight against the Kurdish militia that controls the region [of Syria],which is affiliated with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)." [my emphasis]

more..

". . . the takeover by ISIS in recent days of Mosul and other cities . . . Ankara will likely not only have to deepen its relationship with the KRG . . . but also alter its approach to the Kurds in Syria [I ask: but demand that the Kurds in Syria reject the PKK?]"

more..

"Explains Lehigh University professor and Turkey expert Henri Barkey in an analysis piece on Al-Monitor website: The crisis may force the Turks to rethink some of their policies in Syria. To date, Ankaras friendship with the Kurds stopped in Iraq; Erdogan and his government have taken an uncompromising position against Syrian Kurds led by the Democratic Union Party of Kurdistan (PYD), an offshoot of the Turkish Kurdish insurgent group the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). The PYD has emerged as the strongest Kurdish group in Syria and has put together an impressive fighting force to defend its territory from both ISIS and the regime. The idea of another autonomous Kurdish region on its borders after the KRG has been anathema to Ankara. Paradoxically, the PYDs armed elements are some of the only ones that have scored blows against the jihadists. In the face of the ISIS sweep, the PYD and the KRG, which have also had antagonistic relations, appear to be cooperating on defensive measures against ISIS. Turkey may have to reconsider its boycott of the Syrian Kurds to enlarge the anti-ISIS coalition." [my emphasis]

I don't think that the KRG wants anything to do with Turkey's enemy the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) terrorists -- our State Dept calls the PKK a terrorist group.

Turkey was a key ally all during the Cold War. They have their own Obama in the person of (Islamist?) Erdogan and the AKP trying to convert Turkey's secular constitutional government into something tens of millions of Turks oppose. They are the true Turks. Just as we are the true Americans.

36
posted on 06/14/2014 12:13:20 PM PDT
by WilliamofCarmichael
(If modern America's Man on Horseback is out there, Get on the damn horse already!)

Yes thanks. That was interesting with all the talk about how oil prices are going to skyrocket. Here’s a region of Iraq that can be protected and provide oil, maybe it is that simple. Maybe. And as an added bonus destroy the ISIS and replace the corrupt Iran-backed Baghdad government.

38
posted on 06/14/2014 12:38:10 PM PDT
by WilliamofCarmichael
(If modern America's Man on Horseback is out there, Get on the damn horse already!)

Somewhere way back when we discussed the oil fields, the Kurds having natural access to some, and the Shi’ites to others. That leaves the sunnis having to get theirs via power, which is what old Saddam Hussein did.

It is also a focus of the ISIS leadership, getting theirs the same way as did Saddam.

43
posted on 06/14/2014 12:55:11 PM PDT
by xzins
( Retired Army Chaplain and Proud of It! Those who truly support our troops pray for victory!)

The Kurds, however, have been making major advances into territory all over the place during this “unrest.” I don’t know what their Islamic thing is - what side they’re on, or if they’re some sort of off-shoot hated by everybody.

But in any case, although the media is trying to make this sound like a “sectarian” conflict, it’s not. Sunnis and Shiites may hate each other, but the ISIL group is killing everybody in their path who want submit to them.

The policeman whose head they were kicking around as their “World Cup” tweet was a Sunni.

They are building their new caliphate, and at that point, the only thing that will matter is sharia, to which both Sunnis and Shias subscribe.

Ergo, it sounds like a great place for an Israeli re-fueling stop on the way to and from Iran...

That would be like borrowing Al Capone's neighbor's house to take a shot at him. Once the attempt is over, Capone's gang burns the house down along with its inhabitants. The Kurds don't even have an air force. They can't ward off Iranian air strikes.

46
posted on 06/14/2014 1:18:41 PM PDT
by Zhang Fei
(Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world and that God will preserve it always.)

Azerbaijan is a UN state, and under Russian protection. (It exists as an independent state only because a Russian Tsar wrested it away from the Persian Empire in the 19th century). Any Iranian move would have been viewed by Russia as a slap in the face. Kurdish has no godfather willing and able to make Iran pay for any incursions. In fact, Iraq would be real happy to have Iran help restore Iraqi Kurdistan to its control by invading.

48
posted on 06/14/2014 3:32:01 PM PDT
by Zhang Fei
(Let us pray that peace be now restored to the world and that God will preserve it always.)

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